The present invention relates to an arrangement for theft protection of a motor vehicle accessory, in particular of a car radio, having a codable theft protection device.
In the context of motor vehicles, numerous methods are known for protecting car radios from theft. For example, the car radios can possess removable control panels that can be taken along when leaving the motor vehicle. Also known are coding capabilities such that an electronic coding of the car radio must be performed when it is present in the motor vehicle. The car radio can be put back into service only after recoding, and for that purpose the corresponding code must be known. Also known are covering devices with which the car radio can be shielded from view.
So-called drive locks, in which important electronic subassemblies of the internal combustion engine of the motor vehicle can be disabled via an immobilizer, are known for the protection of motor vehicles. The motor vehicle cannot be started until the immobilizer has been deactivated. Activation or deactivation of the immobilizer is performed, for example, via an ignition key of the motor vehicle that contains a coded transponder, so that the immobilizer can be deactivated only via that transponder.
The arrangement according to the present invention for theft protection of a motor vehicle accessory, offers the advantage of providing, in simple fashion, comprehensive theft protection for the motor vehicle accessory. By the fact that an enclosing device of the arrangement for theft protection can be activated or deactivated via an immobilizer of a control system of a drive mechanism of a motor vehicle, it is possible to implement automatic theft protection that acts independently of manual interventions of a vehicle driver. Thus on the one hand, improper operations impairing the effectiveness of a theft protection system are ruled out, and on the other hand it is no longer necessary to retain, in secure fashion, a code for theft protection of the motor vehicle accessory.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, provision is made for the enclosing device to be a housing, receiving the motor vehicle accessory, that has at least one closure device that can be actuated via the immobilizer, the closure device preferably being actuable via an electric motor that can be activated by way of the immobilizer. The advantageous result of this is that deactivation of the immobilizer, for example by inserting an ignition key into an ignition lock of the motor vehicle, automatically deactivates the enclosing device by the fact that the closure device automatically opens and the motor vehicle accessory, in particular control elements of a car radio, becomes accessible.